April 7/12 12:17 pm - Wheels of Bloor team Statement regarding M1 Race at Good Friday

Posted by Editoress on 04/7/12

Here is a statement from the Wheels of Bloor team:

Wheels of Bloor team statement regarding the OCUP#1 Masters 1 Good Friday Road Race held on April 6th, 2012 in Flamborough, ON

The Wheels of Bloor team appreciates all of the efforts of the Organizer, Commissaires, Police and Volunteers in rerouting the race in response to a single car accident on the course that did not involve any cyclists. The race was delayed by over an hour and rerouted to a bigger loop with less laps resulting in a reduction from 95 to 88kms total.

One quarter of the way through lap#3 heading West on Concession Road#4 the Wheels of Bloor team executed a race strategy of pushing the pace while straddling the yellow line to take advantage of a strong cross wind to make it difficult for the riders following behind to gain any advantage from drafting the riders in front of them. Three riders from our team took turns putting in maximum efforts with the goal of breaking up the peloton.

Unable to follow the pace in the crosswind, many of the following riders made the decision to break the clearly communicated Yellow Line rule and cross over the center yellow line to gain an advantage of drafting the riders in front of them. As a result of the number of riders who broke the rules the entire race was cancelled.

Members of the Wheels of Bloor team executed a race strategy without violating any of the rules. We are deeply disappointed with the decision of fellow riders to blatantly violate the Yellow Line rules solely to gain competitive advantage. We are also deeply disappointed in the decision to cancel the entire race instead of penalizing the violators of the rule. We understand that it may be difficult to enforce the rule given the number of violators but a far fairer approach would be to penalize all of the riders behind the first violator similar to the approach taken by the Commissaires at the KW Masters 1 race in 2011. All left feeling that the day was a complete waste of time, effort and money.